


Departure of Destiny

by YurikoNeko (AlaxxisSade)



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Destiny Islands, F/M, Paopu Fruit, Pre-Kingdom Hearts Birth By Sleep
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-26
Updated: 2014-09-26
Packaged: 2018-02-18 21:30:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2362748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlaxxisSade/pseuds/YurikoNeko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Those islands were the beginning of more than one adventure, but what was the beginning of theirs?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Departure of Destiny

The islands were huge, but she knew them like the back of her hand. It was ridiculously easy to swing from one tree to another, and with every throw she felt as though she was flying. The birds sang beautifully, the fruits were delicious, the weather was perpetually warm. And then there was the water.

                The white sandy beaches and crystal clear water. The way she could see her feet and the fishes tickling it. Deliciously cold even in this tropical heat, lapping against her skin, softer than a lover’s kiss. She would kick off her shoes and swims circles around the entire island, pull off her skirt and dive in with only her tights.

                Because despite the food and the sand and the purest seas, the very best part was—she was all alone.

                The reason was simple, really. No one else dared to go out this far without a boat, yet the materials needed and entire process of making one was just too much of a hassle. That was the problem with the main islanders, you see. They just couldn’t be bothered. Haven’t they heard that no pain no gain?

                The sun was climbing steadily higher, and reluctantly she returned to the little islandlet she had left her skirt on. It was still a distance away from the larger island she had claimed as her own. The stretch of water in between was shallow, nothing anyone could drown in, even if they wanted to… but still. She pondered as the sun dried the rest of her lithe figure. If only there was a bridge connecting the islands…

                Something sparked in her mind, and she dove for the main island, skirt and all.

                It didn’t matter anyway. She gave it two, no, just one hour before the heat will bake her drier than a salted fish.

                Because now that she thought of it, the idea was overwhelming. Right here—over here on this tall tree, she could build a treehouse! But then she would need a ladder… that would come first, of course. Then a bridge, just as she’d thought—And over there, at the cove! There was the neatest little ledge right there, and what she wouldn’t give for a zip line to rocket her right along the mountain wall—

                Her mind was still whirring when her hands began their work. First, she needed wood. Lots of it. There was plenty of driftwood around, but barely any pieces large enough to support, say, the ladder. Okay, she would start with the bridge then. She took out the pocket knife she always kept close to her, and began carving out her first plank. By the time the sun had finished its rounds for the day, her fingers looked like pincushions and she had only polished three decent-sized planks. But as she surveyed her work with an air of satisfaction, she showed no sign of stopping for the night. After all, it wasn’t as though there was anyone for her to go home for.

                His curiosity was piqued.

                “Hey. Mind if I lend you a hand?” He pushed himself off the tree he had been sitting on for what felt like forever, landing neatly on his feet. He bent his knees to reduce the impact, but by the time he had straightened himself up, she already had her knife at his throat.

                “How long have you been watching me?” she hissed, blue eyes narrowing. They seemed to shine in the moonlight, crafty as a cat’s. He opened his mouth to answer, but decided against it.

                “Long enough,” he shrugged instead. It was a clichéd line, but he would rather risk that than have her know the truth. Chances are, she wouldn’t like it. “That looks interesting. Mind if I pitch in?”

                She eyed him skeptically. True, he sure looked capable. Strong enough to lift some pieces of driftwood she couldn’t, much as she hated to admit it. “Okay, but only if you promise not to get in my way.”

                “Deal.” He offered her hand and a grin.

She scoffed, lifting away the pitifully few planks she had. Without further ado he began carving out another, and watching his proficiency with a blade, she got the sudden feeling he could have managed a lot more in the same amount of time. Whatever. She was going to use his skill to her advantage.

                “So what’s the plan?” he asked, not taking his eyes off the work at hand, but still paying rapt attention to her every move.

                “A bridge,” she said curtly. “And a treehouse. A zipline. Maybe a--”

                “Wow, someone’s ambitious.” He laughed, earning himself a withering glance. “Sounds like a lot of work. Lucky you have me, right?”

                She mumbled something incomprehensible, but he fancied it sounded almost like agreement.

 

Over the next few days, she realized she wasn’t the only one with nothing better to do.

                They had the bridge up in two days, a tall ladder in one. And never once did he even show any sign of leaving.

                They toiled away the days and slept under the stars by night, on surprisingly comfy beds of moss. For meals they caught and roasted fish, and ate them with a medley of leaves and fruit. Their mutual favorite was a yellow star-shaped fruit, sweet tinged with sour.

                “What’s it called?” he wondered aloud one day as he polished off his fifth.

                “No one knows, really,” she shrugged, cutting one into thin slices to be preserved. “It’s only found on this one island, and well, we’re the only ones to come here, as far as I know.”

                “There must be some sort of clue!” Frustrated, he kicked a drifting plank. Something caught the corner of his eye. “Hey, look!”

                Obligingly, she obeyed. She had learned not to argue with him with the trivial things. Either he wins, or he lets her win. Either way, she was stuck with the annoying feeling of having lost. “There’s some writing… but it’s faded…”

               “Probably some shipwrecked guy with nothing better to do.” He squinted hard. “It says… ‘Please marry me, Olivia P. Underwood…. Eww, tacky.”

                “How do you see all that?” she frowned, bending over the plank. “All I see is P-a-O-P-U… but this shape next to it looks pretty much like our fruit…”

                “Paopu, eh? How on earth did you come up with that?” he laughed, picking up a fruit and breaking it in half. He tossed one half to her, deep in thought. “A proposal fruit… huh.”

                “What?” she mumbled through a mouthful of citrus.

                He grinned back at her, and she almost choked. There was a mischievous look in his eyes she didn’t like.

                “A love that transcends seas—maybe what it’s trying to tell us is that when two people share a paopu, their destinies will be intertwined forever.”

                She spat out whatever she had left in her mouth. 

 

“Ow!”

                He looked at her over his shoulder. “What now? Another shell?”

                “You know it,” she growled, plucking the offending object out of her right foot. Thank goodness it hadn’t drawn blood. “Why are there so many of them around?”

                “If you look closely, they’re actually quite pretty,” he said absently, tying some planks together to be brought up to the treehouse. “Especially these long shaped ones with the flower-shape bit at the end. Thalassas, they’re called. Apparently they bring good luck on the seas.”

                “Really?” She stared at the one in her hand. It was white, tinged with a pink hue. “I guess… it is quite beautiful…”

                “See?” With a huff, he lifted the planks onto his shoulder, ruffling up the hair that was gradually growing longer and unruly. “They’re my favorite, but a little hard to find. I could barely find any on the mainland, but I’m seeing more here. Then again, I shouldn’t waste my time collecting pretty shells when we have better things to do, right?”

                “…Right.” Finally she tore her gaze off the shell, and inexplicably found it turning to a little bit of rope he left on the sand. And then, to the ‘paopu’ fruit…

 

There was one part of the island she wouldn’t change, though. A small cave, hidden next to waterfall and crawling with roots. There was a feeling to it she couldn’t quite describe, a feeling of closeness, warmth and familiarity. And the walls…

                “That’s vandalism, you know.”

                “It’s just chalk!” she protested, scribbling all over them. “It fades. Besides, don’t you think we should put our names here? We are the first to discover this place after all.”

                He looked at her oddly. “Do you really believe that?”

                The chalk fell out of her hand, smashing into a million pieces. “We’re not?”

                “Well, just look around.” He touched an area on the wall just above her head. “Like you said… it fades. But it’s definitely here, all right.” He glanced at her crestfallen expression, and caught himself. “Well, we might not be the first to come here, but we’re the first to do anything about it, right? We’re like—like the founding fathers of this island! So… we should give it a name?”

                “A name?” She looked up at him blankly.

                “Yeah! We’ll write it right here: the island’s name, and underneath it, our own. And even if the writing fades, the name will stick, because it will be the name that describes the island in its truest.”

                “So… what name?”

                He mused it over, but she waited patiently. When he said he would do something, he would do it. In some ways, he was dependable as the island itself, unswaying amidst the waves.

                “Destiny. We’ll call it Destiny Islands.” He beamed at her, and she beamed back, her disappointment all but forgotten. “Because it was destiny that led us here.”

                So she wrote, in her best handwriting, the name ‘Destiny Islands’. And underneath that, she carved out their names, intertwined.

 

A year later, they had done all they could do with the islands. It was time they handed it over to someone else. And it was time they moved on with their lives.

                He held out his hand to her, from atop the bridge, the sunlight behind him giving him an almost angelic silhouette. “Let’s go. We’ll tell the people in the mainland about the paopu, the cave, everything, and maybe they can bring their kids over here to play. But after that, we gotta go. I mean,” he blushed, averting his gaze, “ _I_ gotta go. My dad’s here to bring me home, but you—you don’t have to come with me if you don’t--”

                With a leap higher than he had deemed possible, so high it seemed as though she could touch the clouds, she was up on the bridge and grasping his hand tightly, so tight he thought it would break. She was never letting him go. Ever.

                “Here.”

                He opened his hand, and found something in it. Five thalassa shells, tied in the shape of a paopu, which more or less summed up everything they shared here. And if he squinted hard enough, he could just make out a face doodled on one of the corners. “Is that—me?”

                “Yeah. Sorta.” She pouted, but her face was redder than the setting sun. “If… the individual shell means safe voyage, and the paopu signifies transcendence across the worlds, then…”

                “…this means, wherever we go, we’ll always make it home.” He stared at it for one long moment, then pitched it into the sea with all his might. She lunged for it, but too late—it slipped right through her fingers.

                “H-hey! What was that for?”

                “If you had given me this five minutes ago, I would have cherished it for life,” he said simply. “Because it would be something for me to remember this place by. But now that you’re coming with me, I don’t need it any more. Because I have you. And if ever I forget, you will always be there to remind me, of Destiny Islands.”

 

Eight years later--

“Oh, yeah. I made us good luck charms.”

                “Whoa!” Ven caught the yellow-tinted ornament, but barely. “I get one too?”

                “Of course,” she smiled. “One for each of us.”

“Somewhere out there, there's this tree with star-shaped fruit...”

He stared at the ever familiar shape in his hand. Why was she bringing this back up now? But then he looked to his right, and knew. Of course. Ven was in on this now, too. The three of them were a team.

“The fruit represents an unbreakable connection,” she was saying. “So as long as you and your friends carry good luck charms shaped like it, nothing can ever drive you apart. You'll always find your way back to each other.”

She winked at him. “Technically, I think you're supposed to make them with seashells, but I did the best with what I had."

Was she still mad that he had thrown away her first one? Well, he had to give her this much: her handicraft skills had improved tremendously these past years. He sighed. “Sometimes you are _such a girl.”_

“Hey. What do you mean, sometimes?”

 

“Can you read this, Sora?”

                “What, Riku?”

“Over here! There’s some writing…”

“You mean, we’re not the first to find this place? Aww…”

“Of course not, you idiot! Now help me read this!”

“I think it says… Destiny Islands! And then… and then…”

                “Two names. But… they’re faded…”

**Author's Note:**

> So this is my humble take on the origins of those islands~ It's an old story, and I'm pretty sure it's been jossed by now, butt ah well, I hope you liked it!


End file.
